While I appreciate the sentiment of the article, and I agree that drawing is of the "1st degree" (I also believe speech to be of the first degree) a mistake is made here about the nature of drawing. Some of the argument falls apart when you realize that act of drawing is not simply a question of representation. There's a whole world to drawing which is about things which do not exist, or rather those things which have no being outside of our thoughts. Or drawing a scene which shows more than could be experienced in real life- thus the beauty of many old, old drawings as well as a great deal of contemporary ones.
very true. I'd like to touch on that next actually, and how it ties in with abstract art, which needs to be interpreted more than 'sensed'.